Thursday, August 11, 2011

The Phoenix Project - Fenders Finis

Got done with my last fender tweakage. I may go back and swap the single eyelets per stay for double eyelets later on, but for now I'm satisfied with the stiffness with this arrangement using backing plates.

These are really long fenders. I'd have to cut them back in order to add mudflaps:

I was so sick of fender tweakagery that I almost blew off the front fender mount at the Nitto M12 mini rack. It seemed pretty stable without it. But I soldiered on and I'm glad I did:

The spacer is M6 sized, I didn't have anything appropriate for an M5 bolt. Maybe I'll replace it someday, although it works and looks fine as it is. Note the faucet washer vibration dampener. This connection, like all on these fenders, has a homemade backing plate like this:

Overall, I'm pleased with these Civia fenders. Very high quality and a heck of a deal at around $40 USD.

4 comments:

Thanks!. Yeah, I'm familiar with Toei. My goal for this was to have some elements of that classic style mixed harmoniously with newer things as well.

As for Honjo's, well, I wanted to try some painted/colored fenders. Beyond that, I've used the Honjo's, got a set on my wife's 1985 Trek 720 at the moment, fine product, but I was interested in experimenting with something new to me as the Civias are.

Don't Civa fenders fly in the face of the 5th rule layed out for thr project? Having been created by QBP in 2007, that really isnt a lot of Provenance and Heritage when compared to some of the other parts here

As a general note, one of my goals is to see how much I can do w/in the framework of the rules. So I'm balancing that also against having a bike exactly the way I want it.

So the rules define the experiment, one result of the experiment will be where did the rules have to be broken.

We'll see that I also end up breaking the "No vintage component" rule out of extreme necessity and aesthetics.

Generally, nobody has tons of provenance in the fender area, maybe SKS? I guess Honjo/Berthoud are higher in the street cred/authentic department.

Had I known about the SKS Longboards when I was buying fenders, there is a good chance I would have gone with that.

Another thing is that I tend to consider fenders more of a consumable like tires and chains, they wear out and have to be replaced periodically.

Ultimately, though, I really, really wanted to do something with colored/painted fenders. The Civias were a relatively cheap/convenient way to do that.

I'm delighted with the results. Probably the next set of fenders I put on something, maybe this bike when the Civia's die in 2 years or so, will be stainless Berthoud's. If I'm still on a colored fender kick, I'll experiment w/powdercoating them.

They last forever and have the best stay/fender attachments, although these are a bit more trouble to set up.

As for the ratings, I ramp back on them a bit, see if anyone complains. Sometimes when I'm doing it for the third or fourth post in a row, it starts feeling a little gimmicky.